Waiting
by Pairou
Summary: Drabbles, some m/m, anime/manga/movie spoilers. Several chapters may be turned into doujinshi in the future. So please r/r.
1. Waiting

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist. _Warning: Movie spoilers._

* * *

Edward always wears his hair in a ponytail. It used to be braided, once, he said. But this arm isn't like his old arm and it's too difficult to intertwine the golden strands. Edward cries at night, murmurs softly to people Alfons cannot see, whispers promises to the brother that shares his name and fondness for warm breezes. Edward sends letters to his father and receives money for rent twice a month, but refuses to call the man his father and speaks of him as though they were vague acquaintances, if he speaks of him at all.

Edward refuses to drink milk, takes his coffee black, doesn't like being touched.

Alfons knows all of this because he watches him; because Edward is someone he feels he has been waiting for. Because his heart pounds when Edward looks at him, smiles at him, says his name. Because he loves him.

When Alfons watches Edward fly and his vision is darkening around the edges until that is all he can see, he wonders why he never told him.


	2. Don't Look Back

I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist.

* * *

They set their house ablaze and never looked back.

Except that maybe Edward turned his head a little, as he was walking, his golden eyes dancing orange. And Alphonse seemed to glance behind him for a few seconds, maybe, the flames painted red on his silver body.

But if, hypothetically, they did, it wasn't for more than a second.


	3. Close

I know you lose hope a lot. I do too, staying up until the sun rises, pouring over books and manuscripts and essays, taking so many notes my head starts to swim. I take my glasses off to rub at my eyes and look over to where you sit upright so effortlessly, reading another pile of binding and paper, trying to find another clue to the mystery. I take a deep breath and settle back into my studious daze. We're so close, Al, I can taste it. I can already see you with me, smiling and waving your arms in the sky.

But I haven't forgotten, Al- that even though you're not yet yourself completely, I will never stop thinking that you're still with me, have been with me all along, even in that armor. And I know that even through my selfishness, you never left.

"Brother?" You say quietly. "Why are you crying?"

I cannot answer.

We're so close.


	4. Lost

I remember your hair was loose that night, floating around your face like a halo in the strong wind. You looked lost in the darkness, the red, cold moon casting an eerie glow on you and me, on your pale hair and my reflective shell. I almost believed you were going to grow wings then, and fly, away from this place, away from me. Then you turned to me, looking sad and tired and so terribly, horribly alive, and you ran to me and hugged me, and it was your eyes shut tight and your metal arm clanging against me but I couldn't feel it.

"Al," you whispered. "Don't ever leave me."

We were both lost in that darkness.


	5. Short

You know, compared to a lot of things, I'm not that short.

I tell you this and you snort softly. It's a lazy, warm day, the heat rising upwards from the earth in lazy waves and we're in the park doing everything we shouldn't be and not working. Al's chasing after a cat or bird, and I'm sprawled out upside-down over a bench and you're sitting beside me, upright and drooping to the side a bit.

Compared to a flower bush for instance, I go on, I'm a lot larger. ...But I have thorns too.

You hum something, most likely not listening.

Maybe I'm secretly a plant. Some sort of... thorny plant with red and yellow flowers on it. And you're a tree. Some sort of cedar, maybe. Armstrong has to be an oak because he's so big and...

You turn to me, that smug expresison still faintly there and so *you* that I almost laugh.

"Edward," You say finally. "Shut up."

I laugh.


	6. Sometimes

Sometimes I think I can feel you.

It's so sudden, like a lightning strike, but at the same time like an aftertaste of something you don't quite remember but you know you should. I don't remember what it is to feel, but when you hug me I almost remember, I almost feel your warm arm and the cold, lifeless metal of the other as you wrap them both around this body's neck. I almost feel the water droplets on you from the bath you just took, almost feel the fuzzy towel around your waist, your smooth, warm skin. Sometimes I think I can be human again.

But only sometimes.


End file.
